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December 23, 2016

Pursue peace with all men, and the sanctification without which no one will see the Lord. See to it that no one comes short of the grace of God; that no root of bitterness springing up causes trouble, and by it many be defiled; that there be no immoral or godless person like Esau, who sold his own birthright for a single meal.Hebrews 12: 14-16

Having been over a month since I have had a moment to continue where I left off, I had to revisit the details of where we were. If you want to review it click this link.

The first question in the random list was: How long can this go on? Length of time under pressure is indeed one of the first culprits which weakens us enough to take pause, when we are heading toward a crisis. It isn't the first thing which happens; usually we have made attempts to under gird and manage our discomfort, but we get frustrated and worn out. Reminds me of the Happy Train analogy we use: Our Happy Train is scooting on down the track and at first there is a bump, then a metal sparking sound and THEN a disastrous flailing of bodies and loose objects slinging around the box car?

Most of us can do well with a bump or two. We are even able to adapt bumps into our everyday life without too much disarray. However, what happens when we are a bit frazzled from "life" and the ride is bumpy for hours? Add to this: everyone around you being pesky, only to have the screeching metal sound shrill the airwaves in a grand crescendo! How would your comfort level be in this moment?

Habakkuk wrote, that it was not of the Lord that we weary ourselves in vain. What does that mean to you? Do you think God desires for us to weary ourselves to the point we are disconnected and tolerating life? What are we pursuing? What are YOU pursuing? Most of us ARE pursing peace....but is it more rightly having what we want, which makes us happy and we deceive ourselves that we are experiencing peace? Even if we are achieving this goal at the moment and no one seems to be grinding the gears of our Happy Train experience, we must realize we've seriously bypassed one of Gods major train stop.

God allows things to go on so that we understand what is going on. The reason I went to Hebrews to address this is because in chapter 11, we were given the great cloud of witnesses legacy. Esau, we are told, sold his birthright to get what he desired to happen. He may have had peace in the moment, worldly peace, but he was not pursing peace with others; it was only about what he wanted. Do you think Jacob was on a Happy Train Ride? What about their parents? Were they happy, did they have peace?

The Christmas Hymn, link above, speaks of peace and goodwill toward men. This is the peace Hebrews 12 was speaking of, not the selfish peace of getting what we want. Sanctification is the only means of experiencing a peaceful journey through life - How long can it go on till you make it? Till
Christ comes again!

Fortunately, as we begin seeing others and caring about the weight of our own wants upon them, God gives us all the mercy and grace to BE different all along the way. This year give something beyond a perfect present, give notice to how you have treated others to get where you are and what you wanted. Give a sincere apology for wrecking their train at times and ask how you might be able to help them find their way back. If possible.......

When we begin living out the long lives we are blessed with in this way, we might feel less days of "How long can this go on?" and more day filled with " How much longer do I get to experience life?"

We are looking forward to our publication being released."See" is our way of singing God praise for creating us in His image. These pages are filled with artist creatively sharing their gifts and travels homeward.

We have been uplifted and inspired by each word written, and illustration designed. We know you will be too.

Making Him Real

We encourage you to click on the Community tab and view a few of the organizations forming our infastructure of care for those in crisis.

We all believe in the power of transformation from Him. We all know He is the only one who is "all" things to all people. We simply do our best to be "our" thing in the time of need which He leads us to.
"Wherever He leads us we'll go!"